Motor drives are presently used in a vast range of applications such as fans, pumps, compressors and washing machines. Motor drives in these applications are required to have high efficiency, low noise and robustly stable operation.
In some fan applications, it is required that the speed and the direction of the naturally rotating (coasting, unpowered) motor be known prior to the start of active motor control. If the fan drive includes a position sensor to detect the position and direction of the motor, this is a relatively easy task since the speed and the direction of the motor can be determined based on the pulses from the position sensor. Recently, however, sensorless fan drives have been in demand primarily due to their lower cost and increased reliability. In these drives it is not straightforward to measure the speed prior to the start of active motor control.